Eric Garcia, Quiet
A Word for What Remains
Maizie Vatsaas
Tall cans sweat little bright buds,
leaving our hands with the clear candor
of a droning August afternoon.
I half speak my fears of failure,
gratefully hold
your assurance like an out-of-season fruit.
A man walks his dog–brown in the sun
and old; in belonging with long-hour
days between the sycamore stands, in the barn,
getting little done but breathe, among
the green satellites of leaves.
As if he saw the newborn moon
in the bright baby sky, he jostles up
the fountain’s stone lip, hand-carved and commissioned
by some great bygone philanthropist.
The man, older by droves, sits with one thigh
along the ledge leaning,
dark wrinkled hands cupped.
Every branch of clear water
that drops along his cracked knuckles
a breeze
that says I love you.
A spilling metallic cherish.
A gesture that wastes no concern
on loss or imperfection–a mourning dove huddled
with its beloved on a branch
though the wind today
is just so good.
The edges of his palms pale and slobberful.
he dips them again and you ask me
if I will write a poem about this. Oh, how hot
this day.
Oh, how you know,
my small and silly heart.
Maizie Vatsaas
Tall cans sweat little bright buds,
leaving our hands with the clear candor
of a droning August afternoon.
I half speak my fears of failure,
gratefully hold
your assurance like an out-of-season fruit.
A man walks his dog–brown in the sun
and old; in belonging with long-hour
days between the sycamore stands, in the barn,
getting little done but breathe, among
the green satellites of leaves.
As if he saw the newborn moon
in the bright baby sky, he jostles up
the fountain’s stone lip, hand-carved and commissioned
by some great bygone philanthropist.
The man, older by droves, sits with one thigh
along the ledge leaning,
dark wrinkled hands cupped.
Every branch of clear water
that drops along his cracked knuckles
a breeze
that says I love you.
A spilling metallic cherish.
A gesture that wastes no concern
on loss or imperfection–a mourning dove huddled
with its beloved on a branch
though the wind today
is just so good.
The edges of his palms pale and slobberful.
he dips them again and you ask me
if I will write a poem about this. Oh, how hot
this day.
Oh, how you know,
my small and silly heart.